Supreme Court upholds 12-year sentence for burglary gang's getaway driver

High Court reporters

The Supreme Court has upheld the 12-year sentence imposed on a getaway driver who was part of a burglary trio targeting elderly people’s homes while they attended mass.

When his two companions were arrested while burgling a house in rural Co Cork, John Faulkner (41), who had been waiting outside, raced off, driving dangerously at high speeds and contrary to traffic on blind bends while being pursued by gardaí, said Mr Justice Peter Charleton in his ruling on behalf of the top court.

Faulkner, of Adelaide Place, St Luke’s, Cork, denied the charges but was found guilty by a unanimous jury verdict in April 2021.

He received 12 years’ imprisonment for the burglary with concurrent two-year sentences for endangerment and dangerous driving offences.

The intruders arrested at the scene on October 19th, 2019, had pleaded guilty and received nine-year sentences in 2020, but two years were discounted for mitigating factors.

Faulkner’s appeal against sentence severity was dismissed by the Court of Appeal in 2022 and was on Thursday dismissed by five judges of the Supreme Court.

Mr Justice Charleton said burglary is a “grave crime with upsetting, though often concealed, consequences for its victims”. It carries a maximum sentence of 14 years imprisonment and a fine under section 12(3) of the Theft and Fraud Offences Act of 2001, he said.

Faulkner’s legal team had argued his jail term was disproportionate to the seven-year sentences of his co-offenders.

Mr Justice Charleton found the sentencing judge was correct to have considered that, in contradistinction to his co-offenders, Faulkner brought to fulfilment the plan of escape from the home of the couple who were aged 86 and 89 at the time.

“That flight from the scene of the crime, furthermore, was done in the most flagrant and dangerous manner that put all road users in peril,” he said.

This is a “core element” of the offending, said the judge.

Faulkner was “within his rights to put the prosecution on proof of the offences with which he was charged: but not at all wise”.

In this instance, there was no discernible mitigation on the evidence, and the sentence was justified, Mr Justice Charleton held.

Ms Justice Iseult O’Malley, Mr Justice Séamus Woulfe, Mr Justice Gerard Hogan and Mr Justice Brian Murray agreed with the ruling.